Afterglow
by Fortunas.Wheel
Summary: Jane learns that sometimes you really can't make it better. Major angst. TW: character death.


Maura won't speak to her. Won't look at her. Hell, won't even listen to her.

Jane _had_ known it was stupid to run after that perp, but to be fair, she hadn't even thought about running after _anyone_ that day. It was a pretty standard crime scene – dead vic in an alleyway filled with garbage, knife wounds to the torso, either homeless or a junkie, maybe both. Maura had been there, bending over the body, refusing to call blood "blood," while Korsak took notes on the perimeter and Frost pretended to be "scoping out the neighborhood" so he could be as far away from the body as possible.

There was something about the scene that was _off_. It was too chaotic, too unplanned. There was no rhyme or reason to the stab wounds, but the marks on the hands were clearly defensive (not that Maura would have admitted that "without further analysis"). The victim still had his heroin on him, but had a bald head and no hat to be found. Everything about the crime was nonsensical. Who left the drugs but stole a hat?

The trash was what Jane fixated on most. Why was there so much of it all over the place when there was a dumpster ten feet away? Jane had opened the dumpster, not sure what she'd find, but a perp had not been the expected result.

He sprung up as soon as she opened the lid all the way, eyes wild, hair matted, shaking. There was something feral about his movements that put Jane on edge immediately. Before she'd had time to fully raise her gun, he was out of the dumpster and hauling ass down the street.

There was no thought. Only action. She saw the knife he held in his hands and she ran after him anyway.

Jane had caught up to him and tackled him with six uniforms behind her. He'd snarled the entire way down, squirming under her to flip Jane. He was strong, much stronger than he looked, and he was able to twist them into a knot quickly. They subdued him in the end though, and he was cuffed and placed into a squad car.

She can't remember who actually cuffed him. Does that really matter though?

"Maur, please," Jane sighs, but her words continue to fall onto deaf ears. Maura instead heads into the kitchen and pulls out a bottle of wine without even looking at the label. All Jane can tell about it is that it's a red. A deep red. Only one glass is pulled from the cabinets, all airs of hospitality gone, and Maura pours herself a larger portion than she usually starts with. Silently, she leaves the kitchen, wine bottle in hand, and heads into her living room.

"Will you just listen to me for a minute?" Jane whines as she follows, tired of being ignored. Fine, she should have been more careful, and yeah, she did break her promise to Maura about not getting into unnecessarily dangerous situations, but she was _fine_. Nothing happened.

Was it one of the uniforms she didn't know? She hates it when it's the uniforms. They always fuck up Miranda as they cuff the perp. It's six fucking sentences whose absence leads to more administrative headaches than anyone at BPD cares to think about.

"How could you have been so stupid?" Maura whispers from the couch, her first words in what feels like forever. She's still not looking at Jane, her eyes fixated on some spot on the floor instead.

"It was just the heat of the moment. And I'm fine, look at me." Jane paces in front of the couch, arms out to show that she is okay.

"How didn't you see that he was high out of his mind?"

"I did see that, Maur. I just didn't have time to think! It was act or lose."

Maura cries then, and Jane hates herself for being the cause of it. She goes to the couch to apologize, to comfort, to just do anything to make those damn tears stop.

Jane sees the darkness then. The dark stains that splotch the front of Maura's fuchsia blouse. She hadn't noticed them before, not under the dark blazer Maura wore today, but there they are all the same.

"Maur, what happened?" Jane asks, instinctively reaching for Maura's shirt.

She touches nothing.

She must have flinched away from Jane. No touching tonight. Noted.

Maura is sobbing now. Jane knows she was wrong, but chasing a high murderer wasn't enough to warrant this sort of reaction, was it? _Why had she let a uniform cuff him?_

"Is this about more than me chasing that guy down today?"

The wine glass falls from Maura's hand, and she doesn't even react as it shatters on the ground. She just cries into her hands, sobs wreaking havoc and making her body shudder in ways that it never should.

"Hey, hey, I'm here," Jane says, scooting closer – no touching rule be damned – and throwing her arm around Maura's shoulders. Again she touches nothing.

She panics. Jane runs her hand through Maura's back, and it's like her hand completely dissipates, only reappearing once she had gone all the way through.

"Maura," Jane croaks, heart racing.

There is no response, just the continued sobs.

She tries to pick up the remote next, followed by the wine bottle, the throw pillows, the coasters, even the fucking tortoise. She fails at all of them.

This is a mystery. A test of some sort. The answer hinges on something, she just needs to remember what.

But she can't remember. She can't actually remember anything. Who questioned the perp? Who drove back to the station? What time had she left tonight? How had she gotten here? Why was she in Maura's home? Why was Maura's home the test?

"We all get our last bit of time with the person we love most," a soothing voice says from behind Jane. "It's perhaps the cruelest and most benevolent act. One last chance to see who we love most, but they will never be aware of it. We can't touch to comfort them, can't apologize. All we can do is watch, and hope that somehow they feel our love over the pain."

Jane turns at the voice, surprised to see an older man standing by Maura's kitchen island. Dark hair and beard lined with grey, a sweater vest combo, and a pensive smile. She's never seen him before, but she feels like she's known him her entire life. There's no instinctive reach for her gun, though she still finds herself blocking Maura from his view slightly.

"Who are you?" she asks.

"Don't worry about me. I'm just your guide," he says slowly. "Focus on her. I don't know if you'll be able to see her again."

"What do you mean?"

"You're dead, Jane."

Her first thought is that the world is about to open up and swallow her whole. Her second is that she wasted her life.

She can feel him watching her, and then those thoughts go away as quickly as they came. "Go be with her. You don't have much time."

Jane swallows. "How much time?"

"Sunrise," he answers as he fades from the room.

It takes a moment to process, and then Jane decides that fuck processing. For all she knows, she'll have all of eternity to process.

She goes back to the couch and sits next to Maura. Their last precious hours will be spent watching her cry. And Jane had thought Maura was mad before. How could she be so dense? How could she be so dense that she didn't even realize she had died?

What do you say to someone who can't hear you? She has no idea. So much of _them_ is unspoken. Touches, glances, tacit understandings. Maura cooks, Jane cleans up. Movie nights only require one blanket on the couch. Jane brings Jo over when she's going to spend the night. Jane has never been great with the words when it came to Maura. Maybe it is better that she can't be heard.

"I know you can't hear me right now, but I love you Maura. More than anyone else in the world. I should've told you sooner." Jane tries to hug her, but only grasps air. Old habits die hard.

Maura doesn't respond, though Jane knows she won't anyway. She was thinking maybe they could be special, one of those pairs that has a connection that can transcend even death. But they aren't nearly so lucky to defy the laws of the universe.

Jane silently stays with Maura until she cries herself to sleep around 3 AM, curled in a ball on one end of the couch. Jane's end. She tries to cover Maura in a blanket, and swears when she can't even pick it up off of the other end of the couch.

Once Maura is sleeping, Jane finally starts talking. She tells about the first time she realized she loved her, when they were playing that baseball game and Maura wore that god-awful suit and checked the air for the wind direction. As soon as Maura picked up the bat, Jane knew she had met her match. Insecurity washed over her at the realization, so she masked it with snarky comments and teasing.

She tells Maura about all the times she wanted to kiss her but didn't, and how much she regrets each of those moments now. The first time was that day at the baseball field, but the second time is the big one. After her horrible date with Grant, Jane had ended up at Maura's home. There was a moment on this very couch when Jane was sure Maura wanted her to, but Jane hesitated and then psyched herself out. When she left that night – and every other night after where the same sort of thing happened – she slammed her steering wheel and asked herself why she was such a dolt. The memories of these regrets only ping for a second, but it still stings like all hell in that second. She apologizes to Maura for the hurt, for the cowardice, for the hesitation.

There are promises she begs Maura to make. To keep her family together, make sure they know she loves them, to stay strong. Jane needs Maura to stay a part of the Rizzoli family. Anything less would be an injustice to them all, and the very idea makes Jane's heart hurt. She wonders where they all are tonight, but abandons the thought at the pain that follows.

And then she tells of the future they will never have. How Jane would sing their children to sleep on nights when the thunder was too loud, and how she would hold Maura every time they were in bed. Jane swears she can see Maura smile in her sleep when she says this. It's this loss of a future – _their_ future, where Maura smiles and Jane is happy – that finally makes Jane cry. For the first time that night, her emotions don't feel like they're being muted for her own protection. This is when Jane pleads with Maura to be happy someday, to let love into her life at some point. Maura shouldn't miss out just because Jane was too afraid when she had her chance. Jane feels like the thought of Maura loving someone else might kill her, and then she remembers that she's already dead.

Jane is still talking as the sun begins to rise.

"It's almost time to go, Jane," her guide says. Jane had forgotten he was there. Maybe she just hadn't noticed he'd come back. It doesn't matter either way. "You have until the sun is fully up."

Minutes. There are only minutes left. Jane spends them silently watching the sunlight slowly touch Maura's face. In her sleep, she is peaceful, beautiful. Well, she's always beautiful. Jane never wants to forget this.

And then it is time.

"I love you, Maura," Jane whispers in her ear as she stands up.

"All you do is walk outside into the sunlight," her guide says.

"So you really do just walk into the light?" Jane asks.

"Precisely," he smiles.

Jane walks towards the back door, which appears opened. She takes one last look back at the couch, hoping that Maura wakes up in time to see her off. She doesn't, and with a small sigh Jane walks into the light.

"I love you too, Jane," Maura says when she wakes up three minutes later. She doesn't know why she says those words, or why she looks towards her back door when she does.


End file.
